David Woolley schreef:
> That's the effect of putting a TTF font on the web! Anyone can download
> it and use it in any web site.
Well, I think thatís no different for PDF, whatís stopping you from
extracting the original fonts from a PDF file (except that there may not
be tools available at the moment to do that)?
>> bogus anyway, as for restricted use it doesn=E2=80=99t provide informatio=
>> n about=20
>> where it can be used, and the field can easily be changed as well. Also,=20
>
> EOT does provide information on where it can be used; effectively the
> proposal was to allow unrestricted fonts to be used without this mechanism -
> you would still need to use something like EOT for level 2 or 3.
I suppose. But itís easy to circumvent that protection, if you want.
Using a font that you didnít pay for is illegal, DRM or no. So I really
donít see the need for DRM, it doesnít actually help font authors to
find illegal applications of their fonts more easily, and I sincerely
doubt whether in a lawsuit they will have *more* right for compensation
of unauthorised use of their work when DRM is present, than without.
Itís just that I donít see a point in all kinds of protection measures
when they can be broken easily by someone intent on using them
illegally. For the purpose of making things more complicated, Iíd say
having them referenced in CSS files should be sufficient to scare away
the layman user. For the purpose of someone who really wants to use them
illegally, he is breaking the law by stealing, and the legal system is
solid enough to take care of that.
So thatís why I think all kinds of semi-protections like using
restricting site URLs and distribution levels is really useless and only
making things needlessly difficult.
What would be useful is making a clear note in the specification text
that most fonts (even the ones delivered with the userís OS) have
copyrights on them and may not be redistributed without permission. That
should be sufficient warning.
WRT claiming ignorance, so I suppose I can also claim ignorance about
the copyright laws when I copy that game from my neighbour? I donít
think that such an argument would hold. Violations of copyright by
non-professionals is not where the money is anyway (contrary to e.g.
distributing music, where there are some valid arguments for using DRM).
In any case, I really think this is something that the legal system
should take care of and not the user agents, whose goal is to show the
fonts, not protect the font authors.
~Grauw
--
Ushiko-san! Kimi wa doushite, Ushiko-san nan da!!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Laurens Holst, student, university of Utrecht, the Netherlands.
Website: www.grauw.nl. Backbase employee; www.backbase.com.